Some random thoughts on first aid training......
Everybody ought to have some basic first aid training, just like everybody ought to have some basic handgun training and everybody ought to have some basic driver's training. Everybody ought to, most people don't.
Check out the Red Cross's new Wilderness First Aid course (
http://www.webtransylvania.com/redcross/wfab.htm ), if it's available in your area. It was developed in-house by a tiny little Red Cross chapter in Transylvania County, North Carolina and, by all reports it is very well-designed. I've got class dates in September and it's only costing $35 for the twenty hours. Of course, at $35 you don't get any take-home textbooks. I've seen it offered in Houston for $75 including copies of all texts. (As a comparison, Community First Aid ran $25 when I renewed a couple of months ago.)
1st Responder training generally comes after "Community 1st Aid/General First Aid" classes and prior to an EMT-Basic course. It's a good broad spectrum course. If you are looking at med training for a gun range, I'd suggest also talking to your local EMS guys about either having them put on a class for treating gunshot wounds for your guys &/or check into the availability of PHTLS (prehospital trauma life support) classes in your area.
Some of the best training out there is being done by private sector guys like John Holschen of Insights Training Center (
http://www.insightstraining.com/ps/courses/first/tfa.htm).
Ian McDevitt, the author of Tactical Medicine, does classes in the NE. Check out
www.realfighting.com for a schedule &/or contact info for Ian. I've got John coming to my town to do his Tactical First Aid course at the end of November. Eagerly awaiting that one.
There was a great article in the last issue of the ASLET magazine written by Mike Shertz (also of Insights Training Center) on the necessity "scenario-based" training for medical skills. Basicly, his points were that we have recognized the need for inducing stress through simunition scenarios, etc in firearms training and the use of "padded suits" for force-on-force training with impact weapons, unarmed skills, etc, to allow the student to be able to successfully use his skills in the real world and that we have to extned that training paradigm to medical skills also. The first time that a cop has to deal with the blood and guts and screaming of someone who has been shot multiple times it should not be when his partner is lying there (FOR REAL) bleeding out. Unfortunately, first aid training is given very little respect in LEO training and people simply aren't adequately trained to deal with it.
Gomez